Wade Exum

U.S. Olympic Committee officials attempted Tuesday to defuse another Pan American Games drug-testing controversy, saying that they are satisfied that alleged inconsistencies in the drug-testing procedure during the first 10 days of competition have been resolved. USOC President Robert Helmick said that he sent a letter Monday detailing his concerns about irregularities in the drug-testing protocol to Pan American Sports Organization (PAS0) President Mario Vasquez Rana of Mexico.

Dr. Robert Voy, the controversial head of the U.S. Olympic Committee's anti-doping campaign in the 1980s, said Friday he too believes that the USOC is not sincerely interested in stopping athletes from using performance-enhancing drugs. Speaking in the wake of the abrupt resignation of his successor, Dr.

Hall of Fame pitcher Jim "Catfish" Hunter, who ushered in the era of escalating baseball salaries when he signed the sport's first lucrative free-agent deal in the 1970s, has Lou Gehrig's disease. Hunter's wife, Helen, said Monday that her husband went to Johns Hopkins Hospital in Baltimore last week after experiencing trouble with his motor skills. Doctors there confirmed that he had the fatal disease, which attacks nerves in the spinal cord and brain and causes progressive paralysis.

The U.S. Olympic Committee on Thursday provided a lengthy explanation to the International Olympic Committee about the 1988 doping tests of track stars Carl Lewis and Joe DeLoach, documenting the USOC's assertion it acted within the rules by clearing both after investigating elevated findings in tests done before the Seoul Olympics.

The U.S. Olympic Committee's former director of anti-doping programs, Dr. Wade Exum, offered at the beginning of this year to resign his post, claim he did so for "personal reasons" and not sue the USOC on condition that it pay him $5.5 million, sources told The Times on Friday. The USOC declined to accept that offer. Six months later, Exum resigned, charging as he left that he could no longer abide working at the USOC because it was "deliberately encouraging the doping of athletes."

The current head of the International Olympic Committee's medical commission, acting as part of worldwide track and field's executive council in a meeting at the Seoul Olympics in 1988, declared that the U.S. Olympic Committee had properly cleared Carl Lewis and others after investigating elevated findings at tests earlier that year, the minutes of that meeting reveal.

University of Arizona sophomore infielder Kelsey Osburn died Monday, six days after being hit in the head by a batted ball during batting practice at Rochester, N.Y. Osburn, 20, died at Strong Memorial Hospital in Rochester, a hospital spokesman said. Osburn was playing for the Newark Raptors of the Northeast Collegiate Baseball League. He was running the bases without a helmet during batting practice on July 11 when he was struck in the right temple.

Beset by management turmoil, budget concerns and allegations that it ignores drug use by athletes even as it prepares for what will probably be the last Olympic Games in the United States for at least a decade, the U.S. Olympic Committee convenes today to pick a new leader. In an increasingly close race, current vice chairs Sandy Baldwin and Paul George are vying to become the USOC chairperson, succeeding Bill Hybl. The stakes are significant.

The mighty fell Thursday in New Haven, Conn., when Wimbledon champion Pete Sampras, U.S. Open champion Patrick Rafter and third-seeded Petr Korda were ousted from the Pilot Pen International tennis tournament. Sampras announced his intention to rest after losing, 6-3, 6-4, to qualifier Leander Paes of India, who is ranked No. 100. "I felt very flat. Playing three weeks in a row has taken its toll emotionally.

Before he spoke at the U.S. Olympic Committee media seminar Thursday at Colorado Springs, Colo., Dr. Wade Exum, the USOC's drug control director, requested a moment of silence in honor of Lyle Alzado.